Posted on 04/12/2005 4:46:09 PM PDT by SJackson
German prosecutors have provoked outrage by ruling that the 1945 RAF bombing of Dresden can legally be termed a "holocaust".
The decision follows the refusal by the Hamburg public prosecutor's office to press charges against a Right-wing politician who compared the bombing raids to "the extermination of the Jews".
German law forbids the denial or playing down of the Holocaust as an incitement to hatred.
So delicate is the subject of the slaughter of Jews under Hitler that any use of the word "holocaust", or comparison with it, faces intense scrutiny and sometimes legal action.
But prosecutors have declined to pursue further the case of Udo Voigt, the chairman of the far-Right NPD, who likened the RAF's raids to the Nazis' "final solution".
Rudigger Bagger, a spokesman for the Hamburg public prosecutor, said the decision took into account only the criminal, not the moral, aspects of the case.
But he cited as a legal precedent a ruling by the federal constitutional court that favoured free speech in political exchanges, if defamation was not the prime aim of the argument.
Holger Apfel, the NPD's leader in the Saxon regional parliament, caused a scandal in January when he shouted down a commemoration of the Dresden bombing, prompting many others to walk out in disgust.
His outburst was covered by parliamentary privilege but Mr Voigt applauded and repeated the statements elsewhere.
Paul Spiegel, the president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, criticised the decision by prosecutors not to take action. He said the statements were incitement and allowing them to stand opened the door to further such comments.
"Morally, I have no understanding of this," he said. "One can ban such remarks if you use the law consistently. It is questionable whether statements that are clearly incitement come under freedom of expression."
Although the NPD is despised by other parties, German politicians reluctantly accepted the ruling.
Dieter Wiefelspüetz, the interior spokesman for the Social Democrat Party described the phrase "holocaust" in the context of Dresden as an "exploitation of the victims". But he supported the decision not to prosecute.
Attitudes towards the Allied bombing campaign, which killed hundreds of thousands of civilians, are changing. Estimates of the death toll in Dresden in February 1945 hover at about 35,000. All the same, some historians claim that as many as 500,000 people were killed in the raids.
Strictly speaking, the word "holocaust," which comes from the ancient Greek for "burnt", might seem apt for Dresden, much of it immolated by the fires started by the RAF's incendiary bombs.
But its primary meaning is now so closely linked to the Nazis' treatment of the Jews that such etymology appears to be in bad taste.
YOu should follow the thread back up the line from my comment ~ that would be much better than asking me an either/or question that has nothing to do with the issue being addressed.
It's just as pointless to trivialize another group's suffering by co-opting it for your own.
If you believe that RAF bombing runs on Germany were "morally equivalent" to the systematic gassing of millions of innocents, rounded up specifically because they were Jews, or Roma, or other "inferiors" then it's pointless to argue with you.
You trivialize evil by claiming that everything is evil.
The war ended up being so terrible for them that by the time they could get around to it the Allied propaganda claims had pretty much been accepted as truth.
The Japanese casualty and fatality information was much better, but the problem with Hiroshima and Nagasaki is that so many tens of thousands of people died from the effects of the bombs long after the end of the war. There are still people dieing!
Listen up you puppy... Some of us actually fought in wars. You know, shot up and even killed commies in Korea and Viet Nam. WHAT DID YOU DO IN THE WARS PUPPY???? WHINE???
Thank you. I have not one iota of sympathy for the Germans. They brought their deaths upon themselves by wanting to rule the world. We all finished what they started. Now they are crying about it.
Never forget that.
Peace is much better, and war is only justified in self-defense.
Nah! that would be the entire Third Reich that was the Holocaust..
Dresden was merely branch of the organization..
You are very fierce. LOL.
Virtually none of the Germans alive today voted for Hitler.
You don't have to get snippy about it. Just tell me to leave you alone and I will.
I've always thought it interesting that the Japanese managed to keep so many of the "forms" found in democratic government intact clear to the beidereind. Not a bit of it mattered though.
Peace is much better
Peace is not defined as the absence of war. Failure to recognize and destroy evil is to guarantee that evil will prevail. "Peace" is not always the better alternative.
And of those who did, the vast majority had no idea what he would unleash on the world.
Not being snippi ~ just helping you keep on track so you can enjoy the debate without thinking somebody bit you in the a$$.
Thanks for putting it into words.
It is dishonest to contend that the word "holocaust" should be allowed to apply to only one situation of one group of people. Unless, of course, we seriously believe that they are worth more than any other brand or group of people (in other words, a superior race).
It's a yin/yan sort of thing. War is defined by Peace.
The last I looked, that was pretty much all the Soviets' doing, with a little acquiescence by Roosevelt. It was something that practically, he couldn't have done much about, in any case.
Did you have a point?
When I first heard the term holocaust it referred to a big fire. Dresden was a holocaust.
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